


Day at the Beach

by kaihire



Category: Captain America (2011), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-28
Updated: 2012-04-28
Packaged: 2017-11-04 11:52:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaihire/pseuds/kaihire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve and Tony enjoy an impromptu day at the beach. Fluff ensues.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Day at the Beach

**Author's Note:**

> This turned into schmoop, so please anticipate schmoop.
> 
> So, without further ado:
> 
> [there-was-a-girl](http://there-was-a-girl.tumblr.com) asked: STEVE & TONY AT THE BEACH

Steve’s plan sounded like a good idea at first: beach, day off from chasing bad-guy- _du_ - _jour_ , the whole gang trying not to strangle each other, something about a picnic lunch. Tony was all for team bonding if he could team bond with a jug of margaritas while everyone else sang campfire songs and braided each other’s hair… or whatever it was that teams “did” together.

Things in Tony Stark’s life never worked out so neatly.

By the time everyone was done making excuses, there was nobody left to go. And really, Tony wouldn’t have gotten suckered in, but he happened to be in the Mansion tweaking one of the security consoles when Steve got the last “sorry, can’t” text. The big guy tried to act like everything was cool but his shoulders sank and his lower lip jutted out a little and it was way too much like seeing a puppy getting sucker-punched in the stomach. Tony wasn’t that much of a softie, really, he wasn’t, but Captain America had been his childhood hero and Steve Rogers was an absolute muffin and far too wholesome for his own good. Tony was silently thankful that he’d forgotten to send in his own cop-out.

“I can’t believe everyone flaked out,” Steve said, sitting down heavily on one of the couches. He sounded genuinely disappointed in a way that most people got when they didn’t get that promotion they’d been hoping for. In Tony’s opinion, he was taking this far too seriously. “I thought this would be fun.”

“Cheer up,” Tony replied, wiping his grease-streaked hands on the fronts of his thighs. “I’ll still go with you.”

“It’s not the same,” Steve replied, and then his blue eyes widened a little. “I mean, geez, Tony, sorry, no offence—”

“I’ll forgive you if we still go, how’s about that?” There, nobody could resist his million-watt smile. “Come on, it’ll be fun, and I already took the day off.” Blatant lie, but sometimes the best way to get Steve Rogers to do something was to emotionally manipulate him. Pepper would snarl at him for the last-minute schedule disruption but that was what she got paid for. “I was really looking forward to it.”

“Yeah, ok,” Steve muttered, rolling his eyes. Clearly he’d been around Tony long enough to get a bullshit meter. Tony had to admit he was impressed; Mr Goody-Goody actually had a sarcastic streak somewhere down there in his candypop heart.

“So what you’re saying is you don’t want to go because it would mean spending a few hours with just me? That hurts!”

Steve opened his mouth, closed it. Tony knew he’d won before the small smile even crept over the blonde’s face.

“Alright, alright. Just the two of us. That sounds fun.”

~

It wasn’t fun. It was torture.

Steve wanted to go on every ride at the boardwalk, he wanted to eat cotton candy and laughed when Tony got some stuck in his goatee, he wanted to play games that he was totally overqualified for and win Tony a giant stuffed boa constrictor. Steve wanted to eat corn dogs and drink root beer floats (and Tony had to wonder what the Hell was wrong with his life, because did anyone over the age of 10 even like root beer?) and get extra powdered sugar on his funnel cake so that the wind blew it all over his t-shirt and Tony was left to ineffectually wipe at it for him. Steve wanted to roll up his jeans and walk in the surf even though it was way too cold, and gather seashells even though they smelled like seaweed, and walk on the beach for hours until Tony thought he’d never get the sand out from between his toes.

Steve wanted to sit on the edge of a pier when the sun started to go down. And he shrugged off his beaten-up jacket and draped it over Tony’s shoulders, despite Tony’s adamant protests, because it was getting cold.

This wasn’t Tony Stark’s idea of fun, but oddly enough he had to admit he hadn’t felt the need to neurotically check his phone since they’d headed out. And here they were, legs dangling over the water, the sun dipping below the horizon ahead of them, seagulls squawking overhead, their pants still rolled up to beneath their knees. Tony kicked his legs out lightly over the slate-blue waves lapping at the pier. The jacket around his shoulders felt warm and smelled like Steve and sugar and deep-fryer oil. There was a neon-green fuzzy boa slung over his neck and he felt utterly ridiculous.

“Thanks for this, Tony,” Steve said quietly, breaking the amiable silence that had fallen between them. “I know you didn’t want to come out here but it.. it means a lot that you’d want to do this for me.”

Steve sounded so painfully earnest that Tony glanced up. The last fading rays of sunlight played off of Steve’s messy forelock, highlighted his gold-tipped eyelashes and the caramel-colored freckles on the bridge of his nose. He looked painfully young, painfully lonely, adrift in a big world he didn’t fully understand that wanted so much from him but didn’t give anything back.

_Shit_.

“Yeah, well…”

Tony tried to come up with a smartass reply but ended up just bumping his shoulder into Steve’s arm in a light shove. Steve shoved back, and Tony play-punched his bicep. And then Steve awkwardly wrapped his arm around Tony’s ribs and Tony couldn’t come up with an adequate retort.  _I’m not gay. You’re not gay. I mean, we’re not gay, right?_  Except his heart was beating a little faster in his chest and he felt like an absolute idiot.

“Shut up, Steve.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Shut up anyway.”

“Ok, Mr Stark. Whatever you say.”

Tony snorted lightly, but when Steve gave his side a tentative squeeze, he shifted a little closer and rested his head briefly on the blonde’s shoulder. This still wasn’t his idea of a good time. This definitely wasn’t how Tony had imagined spending his Monday. But somehow things turned out alright, and who was he to argue with that?


End file.
